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Underworld: Rise of the Lycans (2009)

Director: Patrick Tatopoulos

Time Out rating

Average user rating

17 reviews

Movie review

From Time Out London

A pointless stand-alone prequel to Len Wiseman’s vampire/werewolf movies, ham-fistedly helmed by sfx creator turned first-time director Patrick Tatopoulos, who should hang on to his day job. The digital video images are blurry, the fight scenes messy, the editing jerky, and the derivative plot absurdly overwrought (‘Romeo and Juliet’ and ‘Spartacus’?).

A millennium before his death at the end of ‘Underworld’, Michael Sheen’s love-struck Lycan, Lucian falls for Sonja (slab-faced ‘Doomsday’ star Rhona Mitra), the rebellious daughter of vampire leader Viktor (Bill Nighy). If their illicit cross-species love affair is discovered, Sonja is toast, so the half-human Lucian embraces his suppressed blood-lust, unleashes his inner beast, and leads a Lycan slave revolt.

Set-bound and sluggish, this relies far too heavily on spasmodic bursts of bloodletting and variable CGI effects. If it is worth seeing at all, it is for the sterling contributions of its three leading British thesps: Nighy’s ham-on-wry imperiousness, Sheen’s straggle-haired ferocity, and Stephen Macintosh’s quietly effective turn as the sneakily ambitious archivist Tannis.

Author: Nigel Floyd 2009-01-23 16:00:50

Time Out London Issue 2005, 22-28 Jan. 2009

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User reviews of this film

The conversation was rela said...

Posted on Oct 23 2009 14:31 The conversation was relaxed and she was laughing it off. ,

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danny said...

Posted on Feb 17 2009 11:11 really good film
blood at some parts doesnt luk good
but it works!!
but dont see this film if you havent seen the last two or u will just get confused and not understand the story
but if uve seen the last 2 underworlds i recoment it the film is great , actors performed extremely well , especially lucian .. 4 star rating from me :)

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jordan said...

Posted on Feb 10 2009 11:48 the film wud hav 2 be da gr8ist film evs

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marc said...

Posted on Feb 04 2009 13:24 i think that the prodominant issue that alot of critics forget when slamming a film like this one , is that its a prelude and should be watched with each of the other films in mind. and it works and it works well. the level of continuity carried on from the final 2 films is commendable. its rare to find in the film industry when that they keep characters regardles of the size of their role comeback and relating to single lines in a script to which scenes can be derived from. although not perfect some things were missing but forgivable. the creators of this film suceeded in making a film that starts the story for all the underworlds. lets not forget that the underworld films was never made with a triloigy in mind due to budgets but have managed over the years to keep pulling it out of the bag well done

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moody said...

Posted on Feb 01 2009 16:41 these ppl that are negative about the film beats me why u even went to see it??? if all u wanted to do is critasize it!! it was beta than the 1st 2 imo

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Aleks said...

Posted on Feb 01 2009 16:10 just great

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usman khawaja said...

Posted on Feb 01 2009 14:50 they try to give this a haunting look with dark mean characters and plot twists which become inadvertently comic ,
it is neither entertaining nor arty but rather tiresome which you watch expecting something worthwhile will raise its head to intrigue you but what you get is a rather poorly scripted ,mediocre attempt at a werewolf vampire genre with unconvincing action ,
it had promise with its ambiant start though sheen is miscast as a action superhero ,
so is the female lead and they have no chemistry together ,which was what saved twilight alone.
the only person worthy to watch is bill nighy as he brings a cold malicious poignance to his character but he alone is not enough to intrigue me to ever go near this movie again ,
after all cinema is more then one man carrying a show and everyone else was rather uninterested and it showed on the screen with a mediocre product and rather a non existent plot borrowed from some great classics of past

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danny said...

Posted on Jan 31 2009 12:05 2 star !!! wtf this film was sikk ... i guess uve got to have watched the last two underworlds to really appreciate this film, ,,,if ur off to cinema and luv to see some gore ,, i suggest this
OR WE CAN BE LYCANS!!!!!!
haha

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Ellie said...

Posted on Jan 30 2009 22:46 It was good but looked like alot of the actions scenes should have been in 3D ..it had that odd blurryness to it that 3d films have without looking through the 3d glasses !

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wendy brooks said...

Posted on Jan 30 2009 15:26 I am a girl and while there was quite a lot of blood thirsty fighting during this film the story was absolutely brilliant and I would definitely watch it again. Total through and through action

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moody said...

Posted on Jan 27 2009 18:10 i thought it was gr8....action packed and instead of seeing more vampires like 1 & 2 u got too see more lycans witch was cool! we really enjoyed it ;) im deffo gtn it when it comes out on dvd :) if u liked the first 2 films [of underworld] yr love this 3rd one ;)

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Steve said...

Posted on Jan 26 2009 11:52 Like Katy-Ann I as in 2 minds as to go and see this film based on the review and comments, however I am glad I trusted my instincts, really enjoyed it, it was dark, gothic, lots of blood, I thought the CGI was very well done, definatly recommend it

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Mark said...

Posted on Jan 26 2009 09:36 I can't quite believe Nigel Floyd is calling the plot Of SHAKESPEARE'S Romeo and Juliet absurdly overwrought. Uness someone else has written a story called Romeo and Juliet of course...

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katy-ann said...

Posted on Jan 24 2009 23:30 i was really worried about watching this film after reading previous reviews, but i have to say it was fantastic action packed all the way through!!!! would watch again and would definatley buy on dvd.

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Mercutio said...

Posted on Jan 23 2009 20:59 You're right. But it isn't.

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